This news story describes the search for planets orbiting stars other than our sun, particularly since the discovery of a planet around a sun-like star 20 years ago. Star Witness News is a series of articles, written for students, that are inspired...(View More) by Hubble Space Telescope press releases. Supplemental education materials include background information, vocabulary, and discussion questions and answers. Common Core Standards for English Language Arts are also identified.(View Less)

This news story describes the innovations, operations, size, and capabilities of the James Webb Space Telescope. The article also presents and discusses the questions and theories that the telescope will explore and test. Star Witness News is a...(View More) series of articles, written for students, that are inspired by NASA press releases. Supplemental education materials include background information, vocabulary, and discussion questions and answers. Common Core Standards for English Language Arts are also identified.(View Less)

This is an online game associated with activities during Solar Week, a twice-yearly event in March and October during which classrooms are able to interact with scientists studying the Sun. Outside of Solar Week, information, activities, and...(View More) resources are archived and available online at any time. This is a scavenger hunt game to allow learners to review science concepts covered in previous activities. This game is scheduled to occur during Wednesday of Solar Week.(View Less)

This is an online game associated with activities during Solar Week, a twice-yearly event in March and October during which classrooms are able to interact with scientists studying the Sun. Outside of Solar Week, information, activities, and...(View More) resources are archived and available online at any time. This is a scavenger hunt game to allow learners to review science concepts covered in previous activities. This game is scheduled to occur during Tuesday of Solar Week.(View Less)

This is an online game associated with activities during Solar Week, a twice-yearly event in March and October during which classrooms are able to interact with scientists studying the Sun. Outside of Solar Week, information, activities, and...(View More) resources are archived and available online at any time. Learners view images of celebrities in various stages of pixellation to try to guess who the celebrity is by viewing images that are highly pixellated down to images that are more defined. This relates to astronomical image resolution and how the number of pixels defines the resolution of an image. This activity is scheduled to occur during Tuesday of Solar Week.(View Less)

This is an activity about image resolution. Learners will recreate a solar image taken by the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) using various sizes of building bricks, and discuss how their recreations relate to image resolution. Learners will also...(View More) compare SDO images to solar images from older spacecraft to see how improved technology helps scientists learn more about the Sun.(View Less)

This is an activity about image comparison. Learners will analyze and compare images taken by the Solar Dynamics Observatory. They will match four magnetic solar images, or magnetograms, to their corresponding extreme ultraviolet, or EUV, light...(View More) images by studying solar features in the images. At the end, they will recognize that areas of high magnetic activity on the Sun correspond to extreme solar activity.(View Less)

This is an activity that compares the magnetic field of the Earth to the complex magnetic field of the Sun. Using images of the Earth and Sun that have magnets attached in appropriate orientations, learners will use a handheld magnetic field...(View More) detector to observe the magnetic field of the Earth and compare it to that of the Sun, especially in sunspot areas. For each group of students, this activity requires use of a handheld magnetic field detector, such as a Magnaprobe or a similar device, a bar magnet, and ten small disc magnets.(View Less)

This is an activity about image comparison. Learners will analyze and compare two sets of images of the Sun taken by instruments on the Solar Dynamics Observatory spacecraft. With Set 1, they will observe the Sun in both a highly active and a...(View More) minimally active state, and be able to detect active regions and loops on the Sun by comparing the two images. With Set 2, they will identify areas of high magnetic activity on a magnetogram image and recognize that these areas correspond to highly active regions on the Sun.(View Less)

This is an activity about forecasting space weather. Learners will use real-time data from NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory, or SDO, to identify a variety of solar features and active regions of the Sun, and then will use these observations to...(View More) predict the probability of a space weather event. This activity will require each student or group of students to have a computer with internet access.(View Less)